Need Advice: Play Safe and Cancel Retake OR Risk to See If I Improved A Few Points?

jeffrey.wt.wu

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone could give me some advice on whether I should cancel my score.

I just took the international LSAT in Asia today and have a few days to think about whether I should cancel this attempt.

A little background: This is actually my fourth take and retaking is not an option for this cycle.

My first two scores (two years ago) were terrible (should've canceled but was too stupid to not do so) and my third take (this Jan.) was a 166. I am aiming for the top 20 law schools in the US.

My question is: should I cancel and work with the 166, or should I see if I bumped up a point or two?

Nothing particularly devastating happened on this attempt but I feel like I performed similarly or slightly worse compared to my recent PTs (which I have been scoring around 167-170). I understand that my situation is not one of the three situations where a cancel is warranted but I was wondering whether already having a close score to my target schools while having no option to retake would be an exception.

I am worried that if it turns out I got, say a 162-ish, schools will think that the 166 is actually an outlier. I imagine even though schools only consider the highest score, a drop on my last LSAT would not reflect well on me.

On the other hand, if I bumped up a point of two, I would probably open some doors to some lower T-14s and may squeeze some $$ for others.

So...I guess it all boils down to how large a drop on the last LSAT would be tolerable or be disregarded by schools?